The invention relates, in general, to a guiding device for sheets supplied to a stacking site and, more particularly, to a sheet-guiding device having at least one guide element which can be pivoted about an upper journal and an abutment surface for the front edges of the sheets arriving in an entrance direction, such surface being downwardly inclined with respect to the entrance direction.
Devices for guiding sheets to a stacking site (collecting tray) are generally known. In such known devices, the guide elements are designed as wire straps whose free lower ends, which are remote from their journal, rest on the bottom of a sheet-collecting tray or on the sheet deposited in such a collecting tray. Owing to their weight, the wire straps function as hold-down elements. The length of the straps is chosen such that the support of their free lower ends causes them to assume an inclined position in which they form an inclined, downwardly directed abutment surface for the incoming sheets. However, the inclination of the abutment surface changes during operation when the stack sheets supplied to the stacking site becomes higher because the support plane of the free end of the known guide element on the stack is moving away from the bottom of the collecting tray by a distance corresponding to the stack height. During operation, this results in a non-uniform guiding action of the guide element.